Cuccinelli spreads love for mandate

Hotshot Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has no trouble with the individual mandate to buy health insurance enacted by Mitt Romney in Massachusetts. The Virginia lawman said the Massachusetts law is perfectly legitimate because of the sovereignty of the commonwealth.

“If the individual mandate is upheld, it would be the end of federalism,” Cuccinelli said, appearing before the House Judiciary Committee on the constitutionality of the individual mandate. “States can operate perfectly well as a sovereign entities, but those rights would be gutted if the individual mandate were allowed to stand.”

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Cuccinelli has been making headlines since he has moved to fast-track the state’s lawsuit against the ACA to the Supreme Court.

“This lawsuit isn’t about health care, it’s about liberty,” he said proudly.

And from his testimony made it clear that he thinks he’s going to win.

“[The United States] should lose this case in the Supreme Court because of the vast expansion of federal power. It is unprecedented and unconstitutional.”

Ranking member Rep. John Conyers of Michigan said the mandate was necessary and constitutional because everyone is in involved in the health care market and the government has the power to regulate that activity.

“The core argument, that this regulates ‘inactivity,’ requires us to accept a complete fiction. “No one can credibly claim that they will never get ill or injured and, in this country, we promise emergency care for all who need it.”